Premiere: Steve Pepe – Oltraggiosa Musica

“I’ll have another”, he slurred, leaning like a toppled monument against the stained mahogany. As the bartender handed him the frothing jar of foggy brown fluid, the drinker’s eyes flickered asynchronously. His crotch was soggy, the stench forming an invisible force-field around his lump of a body.

Steve Pepe has a preference for album-length works. He is yet to release a 12” single, instead releasing LPs: one on John Talabot’s Hivern Discs in 2018, the other on Lyon’s Macadam Mambo label in January this year. His second album of 2020 comes on Inside Out records and is called Vivere in Diagonale: “Living Diagonally”.

As you might expect, the sound is slanted. Its beats stomp with lead-heavy boots and damp-jeans dub echo, always leaning to the leftfield. Our premiere, ‘Oltraggiosa Musica’, sounds like slapped-bass jazz funk on 33rpm. In reverse. Played by a medieval Italian coven. With most tracks stretching to a seven minute meditation, the intoxicating effects of slow time – conjured to a heavily sedated rhythm – are revealed.

Buy HERE.